


Falls the Shadow

by rivendellrose



Category: Babylon 5
Genre: Gen, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-31
Updated: 2016-12-31
Packaged: 2018-09-13 18:25:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,036
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9136126
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rivendellrose/pseuds/rivendellrose
Summary: After John Sheridan goes to Z'ha'dum, Delenn is left to pick up the pieces.Written and posted on Livejournal as part of a series of Valentine's Day fics back in 2008.





	

In the darkness, a single candle flickered.

When Sebastian asked if she was willing to die alone, friendless and forgotten, Delenn had thought that he meant in the future. In that far-distant time when they had defeated the Shadows, and she and John Sheridan had lived out quiet and peaceful lives together. She had thought he talked of fame, and she had no need to live or die as a hero. 

That she might at some point sacrifice herself to their cause was no unheard-of concept for Delenn. But it had never once occurred to her that she might have to _live_ for that cause, alone, and fight their war without him. Sebastian had described them as linked at the hip, a metaphor she had found strange, and now she realized that he had been right. Like a warrior who has lost a leg, without him, she couldn’t make herself stand again.

_All our planning and preparation, all our work, and in the end, how easy it was to tear down everything we have struggled so long to create._

“Delenn.”

She didn’t have to look up, any more than Lennier had really needed to speak her name - his hand on her shoulder would have been enough. No one else had come to see her in the long hours since Ivanova’s professional visit.

_“I just thought you should know... we haven’t had any word from the captain. None of our contacts have seen him or the White Star since he left. There’s no way to know for sure where he’s gone, but...”_

_Delenn held out a data crystal. “A time-delayed message.”_

_“Did he say...?”_

_She took a ragged breath. Speech was no longer an easy thing, it seemed. Lennier - suddenly beside her, always so attentive to her moods, and more a comfort now than she knew how to express - touched her arm, and she turned toward him, grateful for the moment of familiar contact. “Z’ha’dum,” she breathed._

_“He went there? Alone?”_

_Delenn nodded, and felt her facade of calm begin to slip._

_Once again, Lennier spared her the shame of confronting Ivanova directly. “My apologies, Commander, but Ambassador Delenn requires rest. Please... take the crystal. I shall inform you immediately if we receive any further news.”_

And so the human woman had left. And since then, Delenn had sat in quiet prayer over the single candle, seeking for some understanding or comfort, some hint of how she was to proceed. 

“You should rest.”

She shook her head. “I cannot.” 

“You must, Delenn.” 

She laughed, and was surprised by the hollow sound of despair in her own voice. “Will you order me, now, Lennier - is that how far we have come? Perhaps I will come to miss the timid attache who wouldn’t raise his eyes.”

“Only for your safety would I do this.” 

“Don’t worry over me. I only need time to think, and pray.” And yet, the flame was no closer to giving her answers now than it had been when she first lit it. The shadows around them were no less oppressive. She turned to her aide, seeking light of another kind. “How will I do this, Lennier? Tell me - how will I hold this battle on my own?”

“You won’t. Not alone.” He folded himself down to kneel at her side, and leaned forward, the very image of the attentive student. In other times, it would have made her smile. “Commander Ivanova is still here to lead the station, and Doctor Franklin, and Marcus and the other Rangers, and G’Kar...”

“And you.”

“Always,” he agreed. 

“I never thought... If either of us was to walk this path alone, it should have been him.”

“He knows nothing of the Shadows.” 

“But he knows war, and tactics, and battle. I...”

“You will have advisors, and you will learn. We shall all help you, and you will manage.”

Lennier’s unwavering confidence made her stomach tighten. Better if he had railed and panicked - things he would never do, but still it would be better if _she_ had to be the strong one. As it was, his ready acceptance and loyalty made each word weigh like another stone on her chest. “I miss him so much already, Lennier... I don’t know how I can continue our work without him.” 

“You will. You are strong in spirit, and you will succeed.” Lennier’s hand was cool on hers, and she wrapped it in her own, eager for the comfort of touch. His hands were so unlike John’s - slender and unmarked, the smooth hands of a scholar, suited for the writing of calligraphy and the lighting of candles, the gestures of prayer and contemplation, rather than the rough hands of a warrior and worker, like John’s. Their fingers fitted together like two hands of the same body, and she smiled a little at that thought. _Like hands to the mind is the loyal acolyte to her teacher_ , a long-ago priestess had told her, when she was an unruly and arrogant novice. _The hands do not question the mind, and the mind does not punish the hands when they do ill, for if ill is done by those hands, it is the fault of the mind that moves them._

“You flatter me, Lennier,” she said softly. “But I hope you’re right. For all our sakes.”

Holding Lennier’s hand, hearing his breath soft beside her, watching his eyes follow her every move, Delenn began to feel as though the darkness had lessened somewhat around them. Lennier trusted her, as she had once trusted Dukhat - in the eyes of a good student, there was no possibility of failure for the teacher, and perhaps... just perhaps she could draw strength from his honest faith. _For John, I will brave Z’ha’dum_ , she thought. _And for Lennier, I will be strong until then. Until I can be whole again, with John at my side, the light of his trust will make me bold again. For the hands cannot know when the mind falters, or they, too, will grow still as stone, stiff with fear and uncertainty._

Reflected in the crystals around her room, Delenn saw their fingers twined together, and smiled at Lennier. “Come. We have work to do.”


End file.
